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Morning Gazette brings fresher opinion content

I'm still getting used to the idea of walking out of the Gazette for lunch without my newspaper in hand. Yet I love having the day's paper land on my doorstep by 6 a.m. so I can catch up on the news during breakfast and even perhaps sit down just minutes later to respond by writing an editorial for the next day.

My readers are getting fresher opinion content since the Gazette went to seven-day morning delivery on April 20. Today's editorial is a prime example. I couldn't really write an editorial about Gov. Jim Doyle not running for re-election until he officially announced his plans at Monday's 11 a.m. press conference. When we were an afternoon paper, that would have been far too late to react with an editorial for Monday's paper. Instead, you would be reading our views on the subject this afternoon or evening. Now, you could read our views early this morning.

I'm continuing to write editorials in early mornings and to assemble our Opinion and op-ed pages during weekday afternoons. But because we're essentially going to press 12 hours earlier and our papers are arriving at your homes nearly half a day earlier, as well, the commentary is fresher. You're reading our opinions and those of syndicated columnists and letter writers just that much earlier in the debate.

I'm also still trying to get used to that "hole in the bucket" in the northeast corner of our downtown offices. As we reported June 23, our old Goss Metro press, a three-story behemoth, was sold to a Chilean media conglomerate. (Read the full story here). Crews from Chile and Janesville-based J.P. Cullen & Sons spent the past few weeks disassembling the press for packing and shipment to Chile. That work is done, leaving a huge cavern in our downtown building.

That old press printed millions of copies of the Gazette from 1967 until our new press building opened in October 2007. That changeover silenced that famliar late-morning rumble we all felt as the press started to roll downtown.

Readers continue to ask me if I'm working at the new press building out by the Youth Sports Complex on the east side. No, I tell them, our main offices are still downtown. Only our press and distribution center are in the new building. While our offices might move to the new location in some future year, my guess is that as long as I work at the Gazette (I've been here more than 21 years), I'll always be downtown.

So how do you like our morning delivery?

Greg Peck